---
title: As they touch the cold surface of the lofty mountain slopes they let… — Hawaiian Historical Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: As they touch the cold surface of the lofty mountain slopes they let fall in heavy showers their burden of waters borne from the sea. Who acts: winds, lofty mountain slopes. A sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, The Red Mouth Gun, with its dependency tree and the pragmatic
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/17/50/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Hawaiian Historical Legends](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/) / [The Red Mouth Gun](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/17/) / 50

# Hawaiian Historical Legends, The Red Mouth Gun, sentence 50

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
As they touch the cold surface of the lofty mountain slopes they let fall in heavy showers their burden of waters borne from the sea.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** winds, lofty mountain slopes · **What happens:** touch, let, fall, bear, burden · **To what, where:** cold surface, lofty mountain slopes, heavy showers, waters, sea

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, The Red Mouth Gun. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (winds, lofty mountain slopes), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg66357:17:50
# text = As they touch the cold surface of the lofty mountain slopes they let fall in heavy showers their burden of waters borne from the sea.
1	As	as	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	touch	touch	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	cold	cold	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	surface	surface	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
7	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
9	lofty	lofty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
10	mountain	mountain	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	compound	_	_
11	slopes	slope	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nmod	_	_
12	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	let	let	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	acl:relcl	_	_
14	fall	fall	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	xcomp	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	heavy	heavy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	showers	shower	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	_
18	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	burden	burden	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	conj	_	_
20	of	of	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	waters	water	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	nmod	_	_
22	borne	bear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	21	acl	_	_
23	from	from	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	sea	sea	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **touch** | present | winds *= wind* | the cold surface of the lofty mountain slopes |  |  |  |  | vn contiguous\_location-47.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme surface=Co-Theme |
| 2 | **let** | past | winds *= wind* | the lofty mountain slopes *not said here* |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **fall** | infinitive | the lofty mountain slopes *not said here* |  |  | heavy showers and winds's burden of waters |  |  | vn occur-48.3 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme in shower=Location |
| 4 | **bear** | participle |  | waters *not said here* |  | the sea |  |  | vn admire-31.2 «NP V that S»: agent=Experiencer |
| 5 | **burden** |  | winds *= wind* | waters |  |  |  |  | nom burden «cognition transitive»: poss=agent of=patient |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Project Gutenberg book 66357 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 49](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/17/49/)
- next →: [sentence 51](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/17/51/)
- ↑ back to [The Red Mouth Gun](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/17/)